Is It Okay To Gossip?

Welcome, everybody, to Love Life. My name is Matthew Hussey, if you didn't know that already. If this is the first episode you've ever listened to, welcome and shame on you, because the previous ones were brilliant, go back and listen to them immediately. Today's topic is why you shouldn't gossip. I think we all have been guilty of this from time to time. Every one of us has gossiped at some point. We've talked crap about somebody else and sometimes we regret it and sometimes we don't, but I don't think it ever really leaves us feeling any better. But the fact is that most of us do it. Now, this isn't a preaching episode. I certainly have gossiped and will continue to gossip in various ways, inadvertently and unexpectedly and sometimes without even knowing I'm doing it. But I don't want to and I don't think any of us should. And I'll explain to you the practical reasons why we shouldn't gossip. Firstly, I always look at the times when I find myself gossiping or when I hear other people gossiping, and I ask myself, how much time must I have on my hands right now? If I've got time to sit here and talk about someone else in this way, what is it suggesting? Because I have a rule for myself in my life, which is everything that I do should be moving me closer to my goals. Everything. Now, of course, I have different goals. I have goals around leisure, I have goals around work, I have goals around my body, all of these things. So it's not always that every goal, everything, everything I do in every minute of my day should be work, because that contributes to my career. Sometimes I should be doing something that contributes towards my goals of leisure and relaxation. But when I look at gossiping is very hard for me to square that with any single one of my goals. How do I look at that in the context of my vision for my life and say, yes, that's where it fits in. Here's where it's helping me. So, firstly, I think gossip is indicative of having too much time. Secondly, it shows that we're validated by the wrong things. So if you're sitting there talking about someone behind their back, it very often is indicative of where you've trained your focus to go. So, for example, if I start talking badly about somebody behind their back, normally it means that this is a way of me feeling more secure. If I can speak badly about someone else, I can start to feel better about myself. Now, of course, the danger of that is it's not a Recipe for growth. It's actually a recipe for shrinking, because the more you gossip, the less you feel the need to grow. It's a bit like watching Jerry Springer. If you sit there and watch Jerry Springer, how much do you feel like growing in your own life? You don't, because you feel amazing. Because you watch these people, when you go, look at them, look how terrible they are. My life's pretty great. I don't need to do anything. I already. I should already pat myself on the back for how well I'm doing compared to these people. So it's not a recipe for growth. See, there are growth mindsets and there are insecurity mindsets. And this one, this gossiping mindset, is an insecurity mindset, which drives us downwards, not upwards. Instead, if we were to talk, well, of people, that would be a growth mindset, because people who are not afraid of growth are not afraid of other people growing because they actually like a bit of competition. They like people around them who can bring them up and who can actually challenge them in new ways. The other problem with this, as I just alluded to, is it shows where your focus is going. If you're gossiping more than you're complimenting people, your focus is trained in a negative way. You're training yourself to go to a negative instead of going to a positive. And don't ever think that that doesn't affect you in more ways than just your gossiping. It starts to affect you in every area of your life. Because guess what? When you look, when you train yourself to find the worst in other people, you also train yourself to find the worst in yourself. So instead, start training yourself to find the best in people. Next, number three, it gets back to people. It gets back to people. See, the thing about giving people insults is that it very often helps somebody else to go and tell that person that you said that. Now, it may help them in terms of their job if they think that they can get something out of turning that person against you. Or it just helps them be in rapport with someone else. Because guess what? A great way to connect with someone is, is to go and reveal secrets to them, is to go and reveal opinions to them, is to go and talk to them and show that you know things people have said about them, but you're the one who's on their side. So very often the incentive is high for people to start spreading insults, especially because people like to gossip. So when you say something negative, it goes to the next person. And even if it doesn't go directly to that person. It then goes to a new group of people. Because gossip is negative. Very often by definition, it's negative. We pass it around because it's salacious. So we have to be very, very careful about our insults. They don't just go to the person we're speaking to, they go to everyone else that person gossips to as well. Now, of course, you're also spreading the message that you're someone who can't be trusted. And let's face it, any friend who is remotely mature or astute will know that if you're gossiping to them, you're also gossiping about them. Compliments, on the other hand, travel far better than insults. Now, I don't necessarily mean that they travel further, but they do travel better. If you can dedicate your time to complimenting people behind their backs instead of insulting them, you will find that your life will change because of it. And I don't just mean this in the altruistic sense. I also mean it in the sense of you getting more for yourself when you're behind someone's back. When you find yourself in a group, ask yourself this fundamental question. Am I being negative about people right now or am I being positive? Am I focusing on people who are great and challenge me, or am I focusing on people that I don't like? Am I focusing on being better than them and showing people that I'm better than them by trash talking them? Because you can either show that you're better than someone by growing and competing with them, or you can show that you're better by bringing them down a notch. One of them results in you growing continuously and the other one actually results in you shrinking in your abilities and your insecurities over time. And do you want to be the person who everyone finds out talks trash about everyone else, or do you want to be the type of person that everyone delightfully finds out thought highly of them? That doesn't mean that you get fake and that you compliment people on things that you don't believe. It means that regardless, you try to find the things that you do admire in people. And the people that you don't admire, you try to avoid. You try not to make the subject of conversation, because let's face it, if you don't like this person that much, why are you making them the subject of conversation? Why invest more in them even when you're not with them? It makes no sense at all. This is about retraining our focus, my friends. And this isn't just some woo woo little talk about being nicer and being more spiritual. You know, I'm not that guy. This is a talk about practically getting more of what you want by being a more positive person. Take care, my friends. If you're not following me on Facebook right now, go to Coach Matthew Hussey. I'll see you there.